ISIS – IRAQ - KURDISTAN : NEWS THREAD

[Anthea]

Reuters

Breaking News

50 killed in clashes between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants

Fifty people were killed in fighting between Iraqi government forces and Islamic State insurgents in the northern city of Mosul on Wednesday, hospital officials said.

Witnesses said the dead had been held in a makeshift prison created by the Sunni Islamist militants that was bombed by government aircraft. That could not be immediately confirmed. Government officials were not immediately available for comment.

Mosul has been under insurgent control since June, but there have been hit and run attacks by government forces and allied Kurdish peshmerga fighters.

In the capital Baghdad on Wednesday, car bombs exploded in crowded markets in Shi'ite Muslim districts, killing at least 10 people, police said.

(Writing by Michael Georgy; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/08/0 ... ZF20140806

[Anthea]

Al Jazeera

Islamic State, Kurds clash near Kurdish regional capital

The fighting came as a reported Iraqi government drone strike targeted an Islamic State facility in Mosul

Kurdish forces attacked Islamic State (IS) fighters Wednesday just 25 miles southwest of the Kurdish regional capital of Irbil in northern Iraq, a senior Kurdish official told Reuters.

Also Wednesday, local state media indicated that a suspected drone strike by the Iraqi government killed at least 30 people in the northern city of Mosul. The strike was reportedly aimed at a headquarters being used by IS, and killed at least 15 of its fighters. The report could not be independently confirmed.

Both the Kurdish offensive and apparent drone attack came after IS militants inflicted a defeat on the Kurds on Sunday with a rapid advance through three towns, prompting Iraq's prime minister to order his air force for the first time to back the Kurdish forces.

"We have changed our tactics from being defensive to being offensive. Now we are clashing with the Islamic State in Makhmur," said Jabbar Yawar, secretary-general of the ministry of the Kurdish peshmerga fighters.

The location of the clashes puts the IS militants closer than they have ever been to the Kurdish semi-autonomous region since they swept through northern Iraq almost unopposed in June.

Shortly after that lightning advance, thousands of U.S.-trained Iraqi soldiers fled. Kurdish fighters, who often boast of their battles with longtime Iraq leader Saddam Hussein's forces, stepped in as did Iranian-trained Shia militias.

Yawar said the Kurds had re-established military cooperation with Baghdad. Ties had been strained between the Kurdish leadership and the Shia-led government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki over oil, budgets and land.

But the dramatic weekend offensive by the Sunni militants — who seized more towns, a fifth oilfield and Iraq's biggest dam — prompted them to bury their differences.

The capture of one of the towns, Sinjar, home to many of Iraq's Yazidi minority sect, is leading to fears of a major humanitarian crisis.

Yazidis, who are followers of an ancient religion derived from Zoroastrianism, are at high risk of being executed because they are viewed by the Islamic State militants as infidels.

Yawar said 50,000 Yazidis now hiding on a mountain risked starving to death if they were not rescued within 24 hours.

"Urgent international action is needed to save them. Many of them, mainly the elderly, children and pregnant women, have [already] died," he said.

"We can't stop the Islamic State from attacking the people on the mountain because there is one paved road leading up to the mountain and it can be used by them. They are trying to get to that road."

A Yazidi lawmaker broke down in tears during a parliamentary session on Tuesday as she urged the government and the international community to save her community from being massacred or starved into extinction.

"Over the past 48 hours, 30,000 families have been besieged in the Sinjar mountains, with no water and no food," said Vian Dakhil.

"We are being slaughtered; our entire religion is being wiped off the face of the earth. I am begging you, in the name of humanity."

On Tuesday, the U.N. Security Council condemned the latest IS attack and said it "may constitute a crime against humanity."

IS, which has declared a "caliphate" in swathes of Iraq and Syria that it controls and threatens to march on Baghdad, also hold parts of western Iraq along with other tribal allies.

Efforts to neutralize IS have been undermined by political deadlock and sectarian tensions fueling levels of violence not seen since the height of a civil war in 2006-2007.

Critics say Maliki is an authoritarian leader whose sectarian agenda has sidelined Sunnis and driven them to find common cause with the Islamic State, even though they reject the group's radical view of Islam.

Maliki, who has been serving in a caretaker capacity since an inconclusive election in April, has rejected calls by Kurds, Sunnis, some fellow Shias and even regional powerbroker Iran to step aside and make room for a less polarizing figure.

He remained defiant on Wednesday in his weekly televised address to the nation, warning any unconstitutional attempt to form a new government would open "the gates of hell" in Iraq.

Al Jazeera and wire services

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2 ... -iraq.html

[Anthea]

Let’s be blunt: the so-called “Islamic State” is slaughtering people in huge numbers, in a most savagely inhuman fashion and with apparent impunity. The West continues to be all-but silent. The United States, no longer a voice for human rights, except as it pleases, does nothing; says nothing.

There is lots of hand-wringing and press coverage of the ongoing tensions between Israel and Hamas, with a lot of talk about “proportionality” — and there should be, sure. Yet on the subject of ISIS the reportage is wholly disproportionate to their relentless campaign of terror, displacement and outright slaughter against Christians, Shiite Muslims, and religious minorities like Iraq’s Yezidi. There isn’t much hand-wringing at all. As a vicar in Baghdad notes: With attention on Gaza, Islamic State free to persecute Iraqi Christians. And others. Syria; Iraq; Lebanon. ISIS is swarming like a plague of locusts, and destroying everything in its path.

Please read full article:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/theanchore ... satanists/

[Anthea]

Reuters

Islamic State fighters extend gains in north Iraq
By Isabel Coles

Islamic State militants extended their gains in northern Iraq on Thursday, seizing more towns and strengthening a foothold near the Kurdish region, witnesses said, in an offensive that has alarmed the Baghdad government and regional powers.

The advance came after the Sunni militants inflicted a humiliating defeat on Kurdish forces in a weekend sweep in the north.

The Islamic State, which has declared a caliphate in parts of Iraq and Syria it controls, clashed with Kurdish forces on Wednesday in the town of Makhmur near Arbil, the capital of the Kurdish autonomous zone.

Witnesses said the militants had seized Makhmur, but Kurdish officials told local media their forces remained in control there and television channels broadcast footage of peshmerga fighters driving around the town.

The mainly Christian town of Tilkaif, as well as Al Kwair, were overrun by militants, according to witnesses, and residents of Iraq's biggest Christian town, Qaraqosh, fled before the arrival of the Islamist fighters.

The Islamic State poses the biggest threat to Iraq's integrity since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Its fighters and their Sunni allies also control a big chunk of western Iraq.

The group has deepened sectarian tensions, pushing the country back to the dark days of a civil war which peaked in 2006-2007 under U.S.-led occupation.

Bombings, kidnappings and executions are routine once again in Iraq, an OPEC member. Religious and ethnic minorities that have lived in the plains of the northern province of Nineveh are particularly vulnerable.

Sunni militants have been purging Shi'ite Muslims of the Shabak and ethnic Turkmen minorities from towns and villages in Nineveh, and last month set a deadline for Christians to leave the provincial capital Mosul or be killed.

The death toll from car bombings in crowded markets in Shi'ite areas of Baghdad climbed overnight to 59, with 125 wounded, security and medical sources said.

The Islamic State's gains have prompted Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, a Shi'ite, to order his air force to help the Kurds, whose reputation as fearsome warriors was called into question by their defeat.

There were several air force strikes on Wednesday, including one the government said killed 60 "terrorists" in Mosul, but they did not appear to have broken the Islamic State's momentum.

The militants' capture of the town of Sinjar, ancestral home of the Yazidi ethnic minority, prompted tens of thousands of people to flee to surrounding mountains, where they are at risk of starvation.

The Islamic State sees the Yazidis, followers of an ancient religion derived from Zoroastrianism, as "devil worshippers". They are spread across a large area of northern Iraq and are part of the country's Kurdish minority.

Many of their villages were destroyed when Saddam Hussein's troops tried to crush the Kurds. Some were taken away by the executed former dictator's intelligence agents.

Now they are on the defensive again.

(Writing by Michael Georgy; Editing by Paul Taylor)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/ ... LO20140807

[Anthea]

Reuters

U.N. says some rescued from Iraqi mountain siege, 200,000 flee

Some of the many thousands of people trapped by Islamic State militants on Sinjar mountain in northern Iraq have been rescued in the past 24 hours, a spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Thursday.

The militants' capture of the nearby town of Sinjar, ancestral home of the Yazidi ethnic minority, had prompted tens of thousands of people to flee to the surrounding mountains.

"We’re just receiving the information right now. We’ve just heard that people over the last 24 hours have been extracted and the U.N. is mobilising resources to ensure that these people are assisted on arrival," David Swanson said by phone from Iraq.

"This is a tragedy of immense proportions, impacting the lives of hundreds of thousands of people," he said.

"Over the past couple of days, almost 200,000 people have made their way northwards to Iraq’s Kurdistan region, Dohuk governorate, or to disputed border areas inside Ninewah," he said.

“We have also received reports that thousands more may have fled across the border into Syria, and are waiting to cross back into Iraq, but I have no concrete confirmation of that.”

Sinjar district previously had a population of 308,000.

"Many of the displaced are in immediate need of essential life-saving humanitarian items, including water, food, shelter and medicine.”

He did not have details of the number of people who might have been evacuated or who was extracting them.

A spokesman for the U.N. children's agency UNICEF in Geneva, Christopher Tidey, said most of the families remained on the mountain.

"We have received reports of dehydrated children and we know that at least 40 children have died," Tidey said.

The militants extended their gains in northern Iraq on Thursday, seizing more towns and strengthening a foothold near the Kurdish region, witnesses said, in an offensive that has alarmed the Baghdad government and regional powers.

(Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Toby Chopra)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/ ... UE20140807

[Anthea]

PUK media

Call for Urgent Prevention of Human Tragedy in Sinjar Region

Sinjar (Shengal), a town considered sacred by Ezidi Kurds, has been occupied by ISIS gangs since the night of 2nd of August.
When the gangs entered the town of Sinjar and hung up their black flags, the people were fleeing for fear of massacre. The occupation of the town has displaced about 200,000 Ezidi Kurds.

While most of the people are fleeing towards Duhok, Zaxo, some tens of thousands of people are heading for the hills, particularly the Jabal mountains of Sinjar. However, while the tens of thousands of people in the Jabal mountains are protected by YPG forces (People's Protection Force of Rojava-Kurdistan), a humanitarian tragedy will follow surely, as they have no access to water and food.

While we welcome the protetction and defence of our Ezidi people by the YPG and Peshmerga forces of KRG, there is an urgent need for western governments and international organisations like the UN to offer humanitarian aid and to engage in political and diplomatic efforts. The ISIS aggression and terrorism can be prevented, if diplomatic and political measures are taken against the forces behind ISIS.

Amongst the civilans are thousands of children. The international community, particularly the UN, the Iraqi Government and KRG should not leave the civilians to their fate. A humanitarian tragedy must be prevented immediately, as there is high risk of deaths by hunger and thirst.

Sinjar is close to the Iraq-Syria border. Links between the Ezidi areas of Khanesor and Sinune and the district centre of Sinjar are obstructed by Jebel (mount) Sinjar, making it difficult for Ezidis to come to the aid for those in the district centre.

ISIS is continuing with crimes against humanity following its brutal attacks against the people in Rojava-Kurdistan and the Christians in Mosul. Now they commit the same crimes in Sinjar against Ezidi Kurds. Many Ezidi Kurdish women have been abducted. Thousands of Ezidi are forced by violence to convert to Islam and threatened with massacre if they refuse.

ISIS has openly proclaimed that they are intending to transform the demography of the region. With their ruthless methods they have thrown the whole region into an uncertain and dangerous future.

The threat of a new massacre against the Ezidi Kurdish people of Sinjar is becoming a real possibility and the danger is increasing by hours.

Urgent humanitarian demands:
- Providing urgent food and water to those places
- Safe transfer of those people to Rojava-Kurdistan and KRG
- Humanitarian assistance to refugees who fled to Rojava

Executive Council of KNK

http://www.pukmedia.com/EN/EN_Direje.aspx?Jimare=21065

[Piling]

François Hollande called Massoud Barzani : France ready to support Kurdistan, its forces, and to protect populations :

http://www.elysee.fr/communiques-de-pre ... d-barzani/

[Anthea]

Obama authorises Iraq air strikes on Islamist fighters

US President Barack Obama says he has authorised air strikes against Islamic militants in northern Iraq but will not send US troops back to the country.

He said Islamic State (IS) fighters would be targeted to prevent the slaughter of religious minorities, or if they threaten US interests.

Strikes have not yet begun, but the US has made humanitarian air drops to Iraqis under threat from the militants.

IS has seized Qaraqosh, Iraq's biggest Christian town, forcing locals to flee.

The Sunni Muslim group, formerly known as Isis, has been gaining ground in northern Iraq and Syria for several months.

In a rapid advance in June the group took control of the northern city of Mosul and advanced south towards Baghdad.

It now controls large swathes of Iraq and Syria and says it has created an Islamic caliphate in its territory.

'Coming to help'

Speaking at the White House, Mr Obama said US military aircraft had already dropped food and water to members of the Yazidi religious minority community trapped on Mount Sinjar by IS fighters.

The UN estimates that about 200,000 civilians have been displaced from the town of Sinjar and about 50,000 Yazidis are thought to have been trapped on the mountain.

The Yazidis face starvation and dehydration if they remain on the mountain, and slaughter at the hands of the IS if they flee, officials have warned.

Full Article:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-28699832

[Anthea]

Reuters

U.S. warplanes strike Islamic State artillery to protect Kurds

U.S. warplanes struck Iraq on Friday for the first time since American troops pulled out in 2011, attacking Islamist fighters advancing towards the Kurdish region after President Barack Obama said Washington must act to prevent "genocide."

The fighters had advanced to within a half hour's drive of Arbil, capital of Iraq's Kurdish region and a hub for U.S. oil companies. A Pentagon spokesman said two F/A-18 aircraft dropped laser-guided bombs on a mobile artillery piece used by Islamic State fighters to shell Kurdish forces defending Arbil.

Obama authorized air strikes after tens of thousands of Christians fled for their lives from Islamic State fighters who have crucified and beheaded captives.

The United States also started to drop relief supplies to members of the ancient Yazidi sect massed on a desert mountaintop seeking shelter from the fighters who had ordered them to convert or die.

In Baghdad, where politicians have been paralyzed by infighting while the state falls apart, the top Shi'ite cleric all but demanded Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki quit, a bold intervention that could bring the veteran ruler down.

Sunni fighters from the Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot bent on establishing a caliphate and eradicating unbelievers, have swept through northern Iraq since June. Their advance has dramatically accelerated in the past week when they routed Kurdish troops near the Kurdish autonomous region in the north.

Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians and other minorities have fled from Islamic State fighters who have broadcast their killings of captives on the Internet.

The retreat of the Kurds has brought the Islamists to within a short drive of Arbil, the prosperous capital of the Kurdish autonomous region. U.S. and European oil companies there ordered emergency evacuations of their staff.

AMERICA "COMING TO HELP"

"Earlier this week, one Iraqi in the area cried to the world, 'There is no one coming to help'," said Obama in a late night television address to the nation on Thursday. "Well, today America is coming to help."

"We can act carefully and responsibly to prevent a potential act of genocide," he said.

While the relentless advance of Islamic State fighters has threatened to destroy Iraq as a state, bickering politicians in Baghdad have failed to agree on a new government since an inconclusive election in April.

Maliki, a Shi'ite Islamist whose foes accuse him of fuelling the Sunni revolt by running an authoritarian sectarian state, has refused to step aside for a less polarizing figure, defying pressure from Washington and Tehran.

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a reclusive 84-year-old scholar whose word is law for millions of Shi'ites in Iraq and beyond, has repeatedly pushed for politicians to break the deadlock and reunify the country.

His weekly sermon on Friday, read out by an aide, was his clearest call for Maliki to go. Though he did not mention Maliki by name, he said politicians who cling to posts were making a "grave mistake", and leaders must choose a prime minister to end the security crisis.

Last month, Shi'ite militia and government troops halted the advance of Islamic State fighters north of Baghdad and on the capital's western and southern ramparts.

Over the past week, the fighters - deploying heavy weapons they seized from fleeing government troops and flush with looted funds - turned against the Kurds, who have ruled themselves in comparative peace in three mountainous northern provinces while the rest of Iraq was torn by a decade of sectarian bloodshed.

OIL MAJORS EVACUATE

Reuters photographs on Thursday showed the insurgents had raised their black flag over a checkpoint just 45 km (28 miles) from Arbil, a city of 1.5 million which became an oil boomtown when the rest of Iraq was often too dangerous for foreign staff.

U.S. oil majors Exxon Mobil and Chevron evacuated expatriate staff from Iraqi Kurdistan on Thursday. Smaller oil companies also evacuated staff and cut back operations, and several saw their shares fall sharply on Thursday and Friday.

The Islamists' lightning offensive and the threat of U.S. military action sent shares and the dollar tumbling on world financial markets, as investors moved to safe haven assets such as gold and German government bonds.

Attention has focused on the plight of Yazidis, Christians and other minority groups in northern Iraq, which has been one of the most diverse parts of the Middle East for centuries.

"The stakes for Iraq's future can also not be clearer," U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Friday. The Islamic State's "campaign of terror against the innocent, including the Christian minority, and its grotesque targeted acts of violence show all the warning signs of genocide."

Yazidis, ethnic Kurds who practice an ancient faith related to Zoroastrianism, are among a handful of pre-Islamic minority groups who survived for centuries in northern Iraq.

They are believed to number in the hundreds of thousands, most living in a small area of northern Iraq, with small communities scattered in the Caucasus and Europe. Islamic State fighters consider them "devil worshippers".

SOS! SAVE US!

The U.S. Defense Department said planes dropped 72 bundles of supplies, including 8,000 ready-to-eat meals and thousands of gallons of drinking water, for threatened civilians near Sinjar.

Yazidi lawmaker Mahma Khalil, who is in touch with Yazidis sheltering on Sinjar mountain, said the aid was insufficient.

"We hear through the media there is American help, but there is nothing on the ground," he told Reuters in Baghdad. "Please save us! SOS! save us!" he said several times. "Our people are in the desert. They are exposed to a genocide."

He estimated 250,000 Yazidis were seeking shelter on the arid mountain, which the community considers the holy site where Noah's ark settled after the biblical flood. Other estimates put the number of Yazidi refugees in the tens of thousands.

Obama, who brought U.S. troops home from Iraq to fulfill a campaign pledge, insisted he would not commit ground forces and had no intention of letting the United States "get dragged into fighting another war in Iraq".

Tens of thousands of Iraqi Christians have also fled for their lives after Islamic State fighters overran their hometown of Qaraqosh on Thursday. Numerous Christian denominations have lived in northern Iraq since long before the arrival of Islam.

A United Nations humanitarian spokesman said some 200,000 people fleeing the Islamists' advance had reached the town of Dohuk on the Tigris River in Iraqi Kurdistan and nearby areas of Nineveh province. Tens of thousands had fled further north to the Turkish border, Turkish officials said.

DOUBTS IN WASHINGTON

Questions were quickly raised in Washington about whether selective U.S. attacks on militant positions and humanitarian air drops would be enough to shift the balance on the battlefield against the Islamist forces.

"I completely support humanitarian aid as well as the use of air power," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham tweeted after Obama's announcement. "However the actions announced tonight will not turn the tide of battle."

The Kurdish regional government insisted on Thursday its forces were advancing and would "defeat the terrorists", urging people to stay calm. Local authorities cut off social media in what one official said was an attempt to stop rumors spreading and prevent panic.

The mood in Arbil on Friday was calm but apprehensive. One resident said some residents had returned home after initially leaving the regional capital in fear of the Islamists' advance.

"Two days ago, people left the city if they had homes in the villages and went there. Now people's state of mind has improved and those who left have returned," said Omaid, a 37-year-old dentist on his way to the market.

Residents were stockpiling food and weapons, he said.

Obama said preventing a humanitarian catastrophe and averting a threat to American lives and interests in Iraqi Kurdistan justified the use of U.S. military force in Iraq.

Seeking to keep pressure on Maliki, Obama insisted on the need for an Iraqi government that "represents the legitimate interests of all Iraqis" to reverse the militants' momentum.

Neighboring Iran, which along with Washington had backed Maliki, is working diplomatically to try to find a less polarizing figure who can unite Iraq's sectarian factions. Tehran has also sent elite Revolutionary Guard officers to help organize the defense of Baghdad, Iranian sources say.

(Additional reporting from Isabel Coles in Arbil and Michael Georgy in Baghdad and Michael Shields in Vienna; Writing by Paul Taylor and Peter Graff, editing by Peter Millership)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/ ... 8J20140808

[Anthea]

Reuters

Live News on U.S. air strikes in Iraq

Reuters live coverage of events around the world. Follow @ReutersWorld on Twitter for top news and @ReutersLive for live video events.

Reuters update page:

http://live.reuters.com/Event/World_News

[Anthea]

BBC News

RAF planes to drop food aid in Iraq

British forces are to drop food aid for Iraqi refugees under threat from militants, the defence secretary said.

Michael Fallon said the UK's main focus was supporting the US in its planned air strikes on militants with surveillance and refuelling.

But there will also be food drops, targeting members of the Yazidi community trapped on a mountainside.

David Cameron welcomed US air strikes against the Islamic State militants but ruled out any UK military action.

The prime minister said the world must help religious minorities in Iraq who are under threat from the militants "in their hour of desperate need".

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has advised Britons not to travel to those parts of Iraqi Kurdistan affected by fighting and to leave areas close to the conflict.
Yazidis threatened

Islamic State (IS) militants have seized Qaraqosh, Iraq's biggest Christian town, prompting members of the Yazidi religious community to flee.

Officials have warned the Yazidis face starvation and dehydration if they remain stranded on Mount Sinjar, and slaughter at the hands of the militants if they move.

American troops have already made humanitarian air drops to Iraqis threatened by the IS, a Sunni Muslim group formerly known as Isis or Isil (Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant).

After chairing a meeting of the government's emergency Cobra committee on the situation in Iraq, Mr Fallon said: "We are offering aid of our own, which we hope to drop over the next couple of days, in support of the American relief effort, particularly to help the plight of those who are trapped on the mountain."

Michael Fallon: "What we've decided is to assist the United States in the humanitarian operation"

Full Article:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-28701642

[Anthea]

The Telegraph

Iraq crisis: live

US launches airstrikes on Islamic State, formerly Isis, after militants seize swathes of northern Iraq causing thousands of Christians to flee - follow latest updates

Excellent coverage - please follow the live updates and videos::

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... -live.html

[Anthea]

ABC News

The U.S. government is “extremely concerned” about a brutal group of Islamist fighters seizing control of the Mosul Dam, a gargantuan, poorly-constructed dam in Iraq that, if breached, could launch a 65-foot-tall wall of water into one of the country's largest cities and send flood waters all the way to Baghdad.

After a day of conflicting reports about the status of the dam, which was guarded by well-respected Kurdish peshmerga troops, a State Department spokesperson told ABC News late Thursday night that the dam had indeed fallen into the hands of the extremist group the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS. The group is still believed to be in control as of this report.

“The situation on the ground is fluid but the latest information is that [ISIS] had advanced on Mosul Dam and has taken control,” State Department spokesperson Michael Lavallee said. A second U.S. official and an Iraqi official familiar with the dam’s operations confirmed the ISIS takeover.

“We are extremely concerned by this development,” Lavallee said, “and we are coordinating with the Iraqi security forces and Kurdish peshmerga commanders to develop options to mitigate the threat that this poses.”

That threat is a severe one, according to U.S. government reports, officials and outside experts.

The Mosul Dam was constructed in the mid-1980s on what reports indicate was a terrible spot to build a two-mile-wide dam.

“Mosul Dam, the largest dam in Iraq, was constructed on a foundation of soluble soils that are continuously dissolving, resulting in the formation of cavities and voids underground that place the dam at risk for failure,” said an urgent letter sent from David Petraeus, then commanding general of the U.S. Army, and Ryan Crocker, then U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in 2007.

The dam requires “extraordinary engineering measures” – namely constant grouting operations -- to fill in the holes and “maintain the structural integrity and operating capability of the dam,” according to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) report from the same year.

For 30 years –- and through several periods of violent conflict -- the Iraqi government has managed to keep the dam upright by continuously pumping in literally tons of grout like an industrial version of the little Dutch boy, as a geotechnical expert who worked on the dam put it.

But the U.S. says any failure of the dam could be “catastrophic.”

“[T]he most severe impact of a dam failure would be [for] the City of Mosul, located 50 kilometers [31 miles] downstream of the dam,” Petraeus’ and Crocker’s 2007 letter says. “Assuming a worse [sic] case scenario, an instantaneous failure of Mosul Dam filled to its maximum operating level could result in a flood wave over 20 meters [65 feet] deep at the City of Mosul, which would result in a significant loss of life and property.” Mosul alone is estimated to be home to more than 1.5 million people. Flood waters, albeit at a lower level, could reach all the way to Baghdad, more than 200 miles further down the Tigris, depending on the performance of another smaller dam further downriver.

A 2011 report written by a USACE official and published in Water Power magazine estimated failure “could lead to as many as 500,000 civilian deaths.”

State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters Monday that Mosul Dam “has been in the sights of [ISIS] since its offensive began in June to further threaten and terrorize the Iraqi people.”

Do you have information about this or another story? CLICK HERE to send your tip in to the Investigative Unit.

In addition to flooding concerns, the dam is also a “key source” of power and water for the surrounding area – making it a vital piece of infrastructure either way, another State Department spokesperson told ABC News Wednesday. An American intelligence source agreed and said that ISIS's potential control over and exploitation of power and water is a focus of U.S. intelligence community.

Prior to the ISIS takeover, a U.S. government official long-familiar with the dam said the possibility of the Iraqi government losing control of the structure was a scary one. ISIS may not want the dam to fail, considering it controls territory that would be flooded and the group could leverage its control over the water and power source, but the U.S. official said it would still be up to the jihadist group to keep the grouting going.

“If ISIS does indeed have or gain control of the dam, will they listen to the dam engineers who have been working there for decades and who understand the need for constant grouting? … And then this is the biggie: If they can’t or don’t want to grout, how long will the dam last?... And if it fails, will it be a catastrophic all-at-once failure or more of a slowly building uncontrolled release?” the official told ABC News. “The short answer is no one knows. This is all guesswork anyway.”

The official said that he is not aware of official U.S. calculations about how long the dam would last without grouting but says he understands it to be “on the order of weeks, not months.” The geotechnical expert agreed that "weeks" was a skeptical, but entirely possible estimation.

“The potential for a disaster can’t be ruled out and should be of great concern to all parties involved,” the U.S. official said.

Article and Video:

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/us-extrem ... d=24900290

[Anthea]

Rudaw

Pentagon: US Fighter Jets Strike Militants near Erbil

Washington DC – US fighter jets hit Islamic State (IS/ISIS/ISIL) positions in northwestern Iraq on Friday, after President Barack Obama authorized strikes to push back the militants’ advance towards the city of Erbil in the Kurdistan Region.

“At approximately 6:45 a.m. EDT (Eastern Daylight Time --- 10:45 GMT) the US military conducted a targeted airstrike against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) terrorists,” Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said in a statement.

“Two F/A-18 aircraft dropped 500-pound laser-guided bombs on a mobile artillery piece near Erbil. ISIL was using this artillery to shell Kurdish forces defending Erbil where US personnel are located,” Kirby said, confirming the presence of US forces.

Kurdish sources told Rudaw that the US air campaign against IS positions had begun at 2 a.m. local time.

They said the positions hit were in Gwer and Makhmour in Nineveh province, where the Peshmerga have engaged the Islamists for days in intense fighting.

Sirwan Barzani, a Kurdish commander in Makhmour, said that US fighter jets had accurately struck IS artillery positions that were pounding Peshmerga forces near Gwer.

Kurdish forces have held back IS advances near Gwer, west of Erbil, in intense clashes for the past several days.

http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/080820143

[Anthea]

Perhaps we should ask ourselves what would happed to the Kurds if America were not there to support their people in Erbil

If the Americans leave Erbil what will happen to the Kurds ?????????????????????????????????